conceal her surprise at the indifference with which I spoke of the
failure of my investigations thus far.

The truth was, that the ill-success of my inquiries had in no sense
daunted me. I had pursued them as a matter of duty, and I had expected
nothing from them. In the state of my mind at that time, it was almost
a relief to me to know that the struggle was now narrowed to a trial of
strength between myself and Sir Percival Glyde. The vindictive motive
had mingled itself all along with my other and better motives, and I
confess it was a satisfaction to me to feel that the surest way, the
only way left, of serving Laura's cause, was to fasten my hold firmly
on the villain who had married her.

While I acknowledge that I was not strong enough to keep my motives
above the reach of this instinct of revenge, I can honestly say
something in my own favour on the other side. No base speculation on
the future relations of Laura and myself, and on the private and
personal concessions which I might force from Sir Percival if I once
had him at my mercy, ever entered my mind. I never said to myself, "If
I do succeed, it shall be one result of my success that I put it out of
her husband's power to take her from me again." I could not look at her
and think of the future with such thoughts as those. The sad sight of
the change in her from her former self, made the one interest of my
love an interest of tenderness and compassion which her father or her
brother might have felt, and which I felt, God knows, in my inmost
heart. All my hopes looked no farther on now than to the day of her
recovery. There, till she was strong again and happy again--there, till
she could look at me as she had once looked, and speak to me as she had
once spoken--the future of my happiest thoughts and my dearest wishes
ended.

These words are written under no prompting of idle self-contemplation.
Passages in this narrative are soon to come which will set the minds of
others in judgment on my conduct. It is right that the best and the
worst of me should be fairly balanced before that time.

On the morning after my return from Hampshire I took Marian upstairs
into my working-room, and there laid before her the plan that I had
matured thus far, for mastering the one assailable point in the life of
Sir Percival Glyde.

The way to the Secret lay through the mystery, hitherto impenetrable to
all of us, of the woman in white. The approach to that in